MSG Team's other articles

11248 Services Marketing – Definition and its Importance

Stated simply, Services Marketing refers to the marketing of services as against tangible products. As already discussed, services are inherently intangible, are consumed simultaneously at the time of their production, cannot be stored, saved or resold once they have been used and service offerings are unique and cannot be exactly repeated even by the same […]

12655 Breaking News: A Case Study of the Indian Media Industry

Historical Evolution of the Indian News Media By most accounts, the Indian Media Industry is one of the world’s most diverse and vibrant in addition to being largely free and fair. The Indian Media has had a long and chequered history starting from the pre-Independence days and including the post independence and the socialist days […]

12494 Brand Association – Meaning and its concepts

Brand Associations are not benefits, but are images and symbols associated with a brand or a brand benefit. For example- The Nike Swoosh, Netflix sound, Film Stars as with “Lux”, signature tune Ting-ting-ta-ding with Britannia, Blue colour with Pepsi, etc. Associations are not “reasons-to-buy” but provide acquaintance and differentiation that’s not replicable. It is relating […]

10212 Making Corporations Accountable for their Actions by Voluntary and Involuntary Means

Why Corporations Must be Made Accountable for Their Actions Throughout the history of the modern corporations, there have been cases where corporations have literally and figuratively gotten off with murder and wanton destruction and exploitation of the natural environment. Indeed, the 20th century is littered with examples of how rapacious corporations have both extracted resources […]

12852 What are Compulsory CSR Commitment Policies and Their Effectiveness and Pitfalls

What are Compulsory CSR Commitments and How They Work in Corporates In many multinational companies such as Goldman Sachs, SAP, and P&G, employees are expected to spend time on Corporate Social Responsibility activities and in turn, they are rewarded or penalized based on whether they have undertaken the necessary commitments with regards to CSR activities. […]

Search with tags

  • No tags available.

International Retail Industry’s evolution can be traced to the period around 1990s with the ECR - Efficient Consumer Response initiatives that led to the evolution of new supply chain trends and gave the industry a new dimension.

Europe is said to have spearheaded the evolution closely followed by US. The implementation of new supply chain solutions and change of trends of retailing was successful and augmented in Europe while in the US it took a while for the changes to take place.

Prior to 1990s, the retail industry was heavily dependent upon the suppliers and manufacturers who exercised control over the transactions.

The introduction of ECR initiatives saw a change in the power dynamics wherein the logistics and purchase decisions shifted from Suppliers to Retailers. These changes came about mainly due to the new ECR concepts that were brought about in the Retail segment. The entire supply chain focus shifted to being process driven.

The concept of product replenishment and category management were the concepts that changed the entire process flow, replacing the earlier concepts of inventory management and dependence upon the consignment supplies. Further implementation of the pull system gave way to emergence of JIT.

Thus changes in the processes called for major changes to supply chain models to support the new processes.

Retailers began to invest heavily into building infrastructure to own and manage logistics functions. They invested into creating Regional Distribution Centres to stock inventories and centralise the delivery system as well as implement ‘On Call Delivery’ system to the stores.

These initiatives brought about a lot of benefits and advantages in terms of inventory control, control over wastage and spillage as well as reduced inventories. Thereafter we see the development of Warehousing and Logistics growing as specialized areas of operation that yielded major advantages to the entire supply chain.

Developing specialised Distribution and Warehousing as well as Logistics solutions called for huge investments as well as management focus. Thus began the trend of Third Part Logistics Services or the LSP services.

Being independant as well as highly specialised in inventory and distribution operations, the LSPs could focus on providing innovative and efficient services besides taking off the investments from the Retail Company’s balance sheets.

In the beginning the LSPs were setting up distribution services and temperature controlled warehouses for specific retail clients. Few years down the line, the industry matured enough to be able to provide consolidated Regional Distribution Centres for all Retailers where the inventory or the space could be charged based on occupancy and services provided.

All of the above mentioned major changes in the evolution of supply chain solutions for the International Retail industry were enabled mainly by the development and availability of technology. EDI and Electronic Funds Transfer ushered major changes in the supply chain providing major cost benefits to the retailers.

Availability of warehousing softwares to drive warehouse operations and the ability to interface the same with the Retailers inventory systems coupled with the ability to exchange real time data on transactions and documents brought about increased efficiency and reduced costs of operations.

Article Written by

MSG Team

An insightful writer passionate about sharing expertise, trends, and tips, dedicated to inspiring and informing readers through engaging and thoughtful content.

Leave a reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Related Articles

International Retail Store Design Principles – The Principle of Totality

MSG Team

Retail Fashion Industry and Youth

MSG Team

Retail Fashion Advertising for Youth

MSG Team